Wilding : The Return of Nature to an English Farm

Wilding tells the story of a remarkable experiment: the purposeful rewilding of the Knepp Estate in West Sussex, the revival of natural ecological processes, and the stunning recovery of flora and fauna. Forced to accept that their West Sussex farming business had become economically unsustainable, Isabella Tree and her husband made a spectacular leap of faith: rather than investing more money in a failing enterprise, they decided to allow 'self-willed ecological processes' to restore themselves, natural processes to occur with minimal hindrance, and with no pre-determined targets. The results have been spectacular. Over the last ten years many rare and threatened species have returned to the Knepp Estate: turtle doves, nightingales, purple emperor butterflies, cuckoos, lesser spotted woodpeckers, lapwing, ravens, peregrine falcons, red kites, and sparrow hawks, can all now be found on the estate, and often in large numbers. This recovery has taken place against a backdrop of great loss: Britain's most endangered species have declined by 58% since the 1970s with one in ten threatened with extinction. Bees and other pollinating insects are in crisis. In 2014 the RSPB calculated we've lost 40 million birds since 1966. Our flora is failing, too. Knepp offers a dynamic, sustainable and productive alternative to conventional conservation, and stands as a heartening contrast to the bleak story of decline which has been the norm in the UK over the last fifty years. Wilding by Isabella Tree demonstrates that such loss is far from inevitable.